


Do I Wanna Know?

by TheDemonLedger



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Emotional Hurt, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Flashbacks, Implied Relationships, Mild Language, Mild Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-08
Updated: 2018-12-08
Packaged: 2019-09-14 02:47:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,328
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16904670
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDemonLedger/pseuds/TheDemonLedger
Summary: "I am a Time Lord. I can see things that no one else can - patterns in space and time. She was… it. She was the pattern I had been searching for and… without her… I wasn’t sure what to do. My hands were fists, balled up in her essence. I had her and I wanted her and I was never going to let her go." The Doctor misses Rose.





	Do I Wanna Know?

**Author's Note:**

> All rights reserved to the BBC and other authorized owners. I claim no ownership over the characters recorded within this story. Please note that this story contains some mature themes and is not appropriate for all readers. Enjoy!

She was everything.

Everything and more.

There’s something to her, something that consumed me. An incomprehensible something. It pressed itself into me and took me over and didn’t let me see where I was leading to. I am a Time Lord. I can see things that no one else can - patterns in space and time. She was… it. She was the pattern I had been searching for and… without her… I wasn’t sure what to do. My hands were fists, balled up in her essence. I had her and I wanted her and I was never going to let her go.

If she left… It would be a forced encounter. And I would miss her as long as I could exist. 

* * *

The wall was shut. The door to the alternate reality, closed, and Rose trapped along with it. There was no getting through, the breach between realities sealed tight, keeping me here and her there. My hearts race, beating a tattoo in my chest. On each side, pain radiates through me. I pound on the wall, screaming, crying. I haven’t felt like this before, not ever. Everything is wrong, every soft footstep or whisper. I turn and lean my back against the wall, tears streaming down this new face I am still growing into. I can’t believe it. How could she be so stupid- how could _I_ be so stupid? I brought her with me, let her follow me into the unknown, and for what? To lose her and everything she was, to never see her again. What a mistake. I hate myself for it as I stalk away from the wall, brushing past those who stared me down, watching me as I crumble. I would not let them see me like this anymore. They had no right, didn’t know me. No one knew me anymore. There were no more Time Lords, no Doctor. The last of my kind and I had failed to keep my one reprieve from this empty, vacant world safe.

The TARDIS hums as I entered. I can feel it thrumming beneath my feet as I climb to the control panel and race through space, time, anywhere, just to get away from this feeling that I couldn’t explain or understand. Everything is making me dizzy, the pounding of my hearts not helping in the slightest.

“Damn it!” I yelled, kicking the leg of a chair. I race upstairs to the room Rose had occupied for two years. It still smells like her. I sink to my knees and begin to sob in earnest. I feel the speeding of the Tardis stop. I’m drifting through space and I don’t care. I looked out the window of Rose’s room and saw, to my astonishment, a sun in the throes of death. I rose quickly and sped down the stairs, back to the control panel. This was my last chance, my one chance to see her. I could go back, warn her, tell her not to go with me, but changing the past, prohibiting her future... to never know her, that would certainly be the end of me. I wipe my face with my hands roughly, clearing my eyes with a few strong blinks, and press a few keys on the panel in front of me. Light flash over my face and I squint, then stepped back.

* * *

 It was over in a flash, the words ‘I love you’ etched on my lips, my mouth still wide, unsaid words like a chasm inside me. A deep, heaving breath comes from my throat, but I pull my tie up a little higher and brush my lapel down on my chest. I close my eyes, trying to keep the tears from falling, but they do anyways. I can hear the humming of the TARDIS, but when I open my eyes, there’s someone there. Someone, but not Rose.

* * *

Eventually I’m alone again, her name still stuck to my tongue, burned, branded. The door is slammed behind me and I’m racing up the stairs and suddenly I’m away to who knows where. It doesn’t matter. Donna didn’t want this, and I don’t blame her. What a terrible life I have been living. But I had to keep going; a walking, talking nightmare. And still she haunts me. Though I didn’t need sleep, never have, I fell into its warm arms with gratitude. It didn’t stop me from tossing and turning, seeing Rose, her beauty, her endlessness in every dream; her terrified face, tear covered and stricken, in every nightmare. And during the day my mind raced. Where next? What terrifying encounter can I fix? How can I bring myself to the edge of destruction and all the way back? And yet, somehow, I still end up here - on her planet; home. With her, it became home. But she’s not here, and I can’t help but remind myself that every time I land in the square at her old flat, staring at the people walking by as I lean against the side of the Tardis. Officially, she’s dead, though the missing persons photos and lists are still tacked on walls and sign posts. I can just make out the edge of her chin, though the paper bearing her image is folded over and crinkled from the rain, weathered and damaged and faded. _Last known whereabouts: East London, with a man in-_ the rest of the paper has been eaten away by the wet. I’m certain it’s me, but no matter. Best no one knows. I walk to the sign post and tear the paper from it. It rips on the edge and corner, where the tacks has stuck it to the wood. I unfold it and look at her, then pocket the image. Best not to make a scene. Best not to cry.

Best no one knows.

* * *

It’s in the quiet hours, when I let the TARDIS drift, its humming the only sound in the endless reaches of space, waiting for a call to action that she would talk endlessly. About school, about work, about growing up, about finding herself in folding clothes and knowing, later, that she hated folding clothes and so never did it at home, to her mother's dismay - at this she would laugh and then close her eyes. Each mention of her mother looked like a physical wound, as if she would remember leaving her behind and quietly, silently hate herself for it. I’d reach out, as if to touch her, but never could. My hands were always stuck to me.

When I transformed, her worried face, thinking I wouldn’t want her with me - that was the worst blow. I would always want her. I still do. I can’t help but think backwards. I stare out into the wide abyss I’m floating through now, wishing she was here to fill the silence, to crack jokes, to run through the ship screaming about how “there’s never any food!” and “how can you expect to bring a human without food!”. My heart aches for her. I have become the empty sort of melancholy you would expect from a child, a human. Not me. I would always have outran her. She would’ve grown old and eventually away and I would’ve stayed me, this form or another. And so I lay on the floor next to the control panel and I close my eyes and I remember.

Oh, do I remember.

* * *

[Four months before]

“Doctor.” she says with the air of impatience I’d always expected from her. “We’re just drifting. There’s nothing out here!”

“That’s the point.” I say, fiddling with my reporting screen on the TARDIS control panel. I was waiting for something, though unsure what. “We’re drifting through empty space so there’s no interference if we need to pick something up. Go read a book if you’re bored, Rose.” She scowls at me and stomps away. I smirk; she’s noisy. On the metal platforms of the TARDIS, I can hear her all the way to her room and when the door slams, I stand upright. I finished fixing the range. I lean against the panel for a minute, pressing my fingers together. She doesn’t come back. I must’ve really made her mad this time.

“Rose,” I call. “Come out, please. I promise there’s a good explanation.” I wander through the TARDIS, making my leisurely way to her room, shirt untucked, coat off, hands in my pockets. She makes me feel free. I don’t have to be quite so put together with her. Her door opens just a crack in front of me and she sticks her head out.

“I’m taking a bath.” Her tone is curious, and she continues to stare at me, as if pondering her possibilities. “Do you…” she pauses, and I could finish her question with my answer but I wait for her to continue, a smile on my face, head tilted to the right. I want to wink. I want to run forward and gather her in my arms and press my lips to hers and all over, but I stay still. “Do you want to join me, Doctor?” I flush, hard, even though I was expecting it, and my eyes go wide as I look towards the ground. “You- nevermind, it’s okay, just forget I-”

“Rose Tyler,” I say, stepping forward lazily. “I would be honored.” Her own eyes go wide in shock now, and she opens the door a little more, stepping out into the hall. She’s wearing a bathrobe and rose patterned slippers. Her hair is up in a messy bun and her makeup is all off. She’s beautiful, but not in the classic sense, which is perfect. I’ve never been one for classics. I reach her and brush a piece of hair off her face, tucking it behind her ear. She responds subtly, so small I’m not sure even she noticed it. Her face is a little flushed now.

“Really, Doctor, you don’t- you,” she stutters, looking up at me. Her eyes are brown, but that’s not all. They’re surrounded by a dark ring, the pupil itself surrounded by lighter color. Her lips are full and pink and her eyelashes are long and full. She looks exhausted. I lean down and scoop her into my arms. She yelps and looks at me with a confused and concerned gaze. “Put me down.” I carry her back into her bedroom, closing the door behind me with my foot. I move through it into the large bathroom the TARDIS managed to configure when she stepped on board permanently. I didn’t even know it could do that until it did. The tub is deep and wide, with a spout in the middle against the wall and a ring of jets around the sides. I set her down on the edge of the tub and reach behind her, turning on the tap until it’s the perfect temperature. She reaches under the water and hums. Her fingers brush mine. “Doctor, you don’t have to-” I press two slightly damp fingers to her lips and shake my head.

I begin to unbutton my shirt and she gasps and looks away. There’s a smattering of hair across my chest as I peel my button down off, throwing it to a rumpled heap on the floor. Rose looks up for just a moment and then quickly back at her lap. The tub is filling slowly behind her. I reach over and empty a jar of petals into it and stand back up.

“Rose,” I say. She looks at me. I open my mouth to say the words I want to say every time she looks me in the eyes, but they get stuck in my throat and I manage to splutter, “I- you know- do you know I care for you?” Rose raises an eyebrow and leans forward. Her hands are at my belt before I can stop her. She pulls the leather strap from its buckle, pulls it taught to loosen the prong. It pops out, and she slowly slides the belt out from the loops on my slacks. I sigh. She leans back, dipping her hand in the water before turning off the tap. She stands and runs her fingers up my chest. One set is slightly damp. She steps away from me and turns around; I can see her adjusting the strap of her robe. It falls of her shoulders and onto the floor. Her body is incredible. It curves and flows and as she steps into the water I can see the exact curve of her breasts reflected in the water. I can feel myself stiffen - this is why I chose this form to regenerate into - this humanoid form. It has mastered the simple pleasures of arousal and gave your more intimate parts such easy form. She lowers herself into the water - it’s deep enough that it comes to mid-chest. The water is clear, and I can see her - all of her. She rests her arms on the sides of the tub, and looks at me, raising one eyebrow, as if in a challenge. I slowly unbutton my slacks.

The feeling of my hand on my zipper is a strange one. Usually, I undo my fly and that’s it, my pants are off. But here, in this moment, I can feel each struggle with the zipper, each moment my own fingers brush over the surface of my bulge. She continues to watch me, her face arranged to be flat and unimpressed. I bite my lip a little in embarrassment as I push them down. Her fingers extend towards me, and I can see her eyes dilate slightly. There’s a rush of a strong, sweet smell from the roses in the bathtub - both the petals, and her. I close my eyes. My head rolls back on my neck and I take a deep breath through my mouth, smiling a little to myself. I toe off my shoes and kick my pants to where my shirt lay, dejected on the floor; stumbling a little at first, as if drunk, I make my slow way to where her hand lays by the side of the pool and pick it up into mine. I kneel in front of her, pressing a kiss to each of her fingertips. Her eyes close at the touch of my lips, and she smiles and hums and squirms a little in the water. She closes her hand around mine and begins to pull, so I stand. When I do, her fingers find the hem of my shorts and pull them straight down. She lets out a breath. My eyes snap shut in fear, but then I can feel her warm, wet fingers around me and I’m going to explode. I put my hand on her wrist and look into her embarrassed eyes and smile warmly before removing my shorts the rest of the way and stepping carefully into the tub. I make my way behind her, so she’s leaning back into me.

It’s warm. This feeling, the tub. I have words on the tip of my tongue that I’m afraid to say. That I can’t say. I will outlive her. There’s no stopping that, no reversing it. She is mortal, and I am… I will never die, not for the foreseeable future. So they sit there, while I move the tendrils of wet hair off her neck and kiss it, as her hands clutch behind her at my head. She moves around in the tub and presses her lips to mine. There’s a familiarity there, though I know it’s from simple physical contact and not any sort of emotional meaning behind the last time we kissed. Cassandra had ruined my opportunity for the perfect first time. This, however, somehow felt more like us. Nothing romantic. I pressed her to me, kissing her deep and long. Her pulling away from me feels like a physical wound.

“I don’t particularly want to be in the bath anymore, Doctor.” she says. I frown, and when she leans forward, pressing both hands into me, I understand, and I nod.

* * *

[Present]

There’s a stillness on Earth right now. Maybe it’s within me. I came back to stand in the square and I saw people moving Rose and Jackie’s things out of their apartment. I rushed up in time to claim I was here to take them, showed my psychic paper, and now the TARDIS is full of her. There’s candles and pictures and flowers outside of their apartment and in the square and it haunts me. Burning up a sun for her would never be enough. I would burn up an entire universe just to see her again. I ache all over from crying. There’s a distress signal somewhere nearby, and I ignore it. I can’t help. All I can do is sit in my own room, away from hers, away from the nights we spent together. I don’t want to keep remembering. It hurts too much, it hurts all over. I thought I was stronger than this. I’ve had people leave before, I’ve had companions pass away after years and years and years back on Earth. But I was always able to see them again. I can never look at her, never touch her, never give her those words.

I don’t think I’d give her those words anyways. I could never spend my life with her. Not for any reason but I don’t age. I stay the same, just different faces. The control panel beeps louder at me, more insistently, and I stand to check it, then slowly, cautiously, make my way back down to where it’s coming from: Earth.

* * *

There isn’t time to think about her with Martha. I try to distract myself, take her on adventures. But there are quiet moments, in between the time she decides to go home, where I don’t have her, where it’s just me and the TARDIS, and the hums of my ship keeps my mind running, a never ending cycle of “Rose”. Her name thrums through my head, and through the sleep I don’t mean to have, and in my waking hours, when I float unendingly through space, waiting for some sort of contact, for an update… I feel her all around me. In the air I breathe. I venture into her bedroom just to sit on her bed. The smell of her has dissipated, almost disappeared. It makes my heart swell with sadness. I wanna go back in time just to find her and have her here for one day, just to see her and touch her. But would I ever let her go? Or would I create a paradox of us, a separate timeline where she didn’t leave me, but vanished? I can’t think about it. It’s too tempting to warn myself, to break the rules, to go back and save her, and I can’t. I just… can’t.

But Martha helps. She distracts me in ways that I can’t distract myself. All the solo adventures I took, the times I went alone to some distant place in the hopes of losing myself, distracting myself enough that I wouldn’t turn around, smiling, and then realize she wasn’t there. I don’t let Martha see that part, and it helps. It helps to hide that, it helps keep it in the back of my mind, pretend it doesn’t exist so I don’t let into it. And she hasn’t asked. Today, however, is one of the quiet days, without Martha to distract me. It’s been okay. I landed on New New New Earth, in New New New New York, hoping for some down time and a spot of drink. I found a quiet bar and ordered something in a tall skinny glass. It tastes sweet and bitter and minty and I find myself ordering three more. I feel eccentric here, I feel exposed. I feel like a child, trying to hide away when they’re in trouble. But here I am, slightly intoxicated, waiting for my hearts to slow and for my legs to stop shaking so I can stand and walk out. I ask for another drink, then another. I’m up to six now. I should stop. I can feel my head begin to spin. I get another. The woman serving me doesn’t give me a second glance when I ask for the eighth, then shuffle around in my pockets and hand her some crumpled bills, get up, and stagger out of the bar. Her cries of indignation fall on deaf ears.

I’ll never be back here.

I make it back to the TARDIS, staggering in after fumbling with my key at the lock for several minutes. I slam the door behind me and lean against it, breathing deeply into and out of my mouth, then stagger to my own bedroom, though not before slamming my hand on the TARDIS and listening for the humming sound that indicates we’re leaving whatever godforsaken planet we’ve come to rest on. My bed is soft as I fall into it. I know I can turn this off. I know I can get away from this if I wanted to.

But I don’t.

I miss her.

I miss her skin, I miss her fingers. I miss the taste of her lips and tongue and her. I miss the feel of her on me.

But I also miss her smile, her laugh, her voice, the curious questions and the never-ending optimism and calculation in her eyes. Her intelligence, her accent, her acceptance.

I miss her love. The way she loved.

The way she loved me. 

* * *

[Three months before]

The bed and her skin are warm. She trails her hand gently over my chest, nails scratching gently. I heave a sigh and begin to sit up, trying to pull myself apart from her.

“Where’re you going?” she asks, sitting up, pulling the sheet up with her.

“We shouldn’t be doing this, it’s not right. One day-” she leans back and frowns.

“Please, enough with the one day. I’m not thinking about one day, I’m thinking about now.” I stare down at her, her words sinking in slowly. I like the way she thinks - it’s always been very pragmatic, but warm. Heartfelt. Loving. I sink away from that word, shake my head, and continue to move from her bed. The room smells of her. Of us. I shouldn’t have taken that bath with her. Shouldn’t have looked at her in the first place. If I’d kept my eyes where they should’ve been, I wouldn’t be-

And she’s pulling me back to bed. I’m not resisting. I can’t resist her. There’s a thrall inside her that makes it hard to give up. To surrender to your own rational nature. I relent, I let her pull me back down, pin me beneath her. It’s a warmth I don’t allow myself to feel enough. She sits astride me now, her bare hips exposed to me, her pivotal point of warmth pressing against me. Her hips grind into me and I am lost. I could hold the entire multiverse in my head, the time stream that the TARDIS captures, and I regenerate, but I know it. I can hold it and survive but this - her, head back, hair sticking to her face where it’s become damp with sweat, fingernails digging into my chest - this may end me. It could turn me inside out and make my whole world stop. She could make my whole world stop.

“Doctor-” she croons, and I can feel her heart racing when I reach up to palm her breast in my hand. “My sweet-” her voice catches and she moans. I pull her down to me, capture her mouth with mine, press into her. There’s a sweet softness about the noises she makes when I touch her. My hands trail across her skin as she whimpers into my shoulder. It doesn’t take much before we’re both on the brink, before a few more thrusts can take us over. I roll over, propping myself up so I’m looking at her, and am overwhelmed. She is small and fragile and yet so powerful. She clings to my shoulders, opens her eyes to look right at me. She claps a hand over her mouth as her fingernails dig hard into my shoulder. It doesn’t even begin to muffle the sound that comes from her, hard and loud. This sound, it throws me over my own edge, and I find myself buckling with the weight of it, hands braced on either side of her head. I am surrounded by her, her smell, her energy, the idea of her. There’s nothing in this world or worlds that could make me want to leave, want to be anywhere else but right here, right in this moment.

I collapse beside her, sweaty, listening to her ragged breathing. “I love you.” she whispers. I take her hand in mine and I kiss the back of it, looking at the ceiling. She doesn’t say anything more, doesn’t have to. There’s no elaboration. We stay here, in this moment.

* * *

[Present]

Martha leaves. I knew she would, eventually. It doesn’t break me like I think it should. There’s always a moment, after someone leaves that breaks me, but she doesn’t. I am still numb, all over. She tells me about ‘getting out’, and I know what she means. I am, to put it plainly, easy to grow invested in. They’re all the same, these humans I take with me. Putting too much stock into the things I say or the looks I give them. I sit down at the control panel, listening to the whum of the TARDIS, listening to the universe flying by. There’s a part of me that wonders if I will ever not be numb. If there’s a way to forget or move on. My heart aches. Everything aches.

And the memories of her will always come flooding back.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed, please give it a bookmark, a kudo, or a comment.  
> If you want to see more of my work, please click the username at the beginning of the story. Thanks again!


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